Letters to THE EDITOR

May 16, 2018

3 Min Read

Ban the Immigrants The HS Brahma Committee report on land reforms has made it clear that illegal Muslim immigrants from Bangladesh pose the greatest threat to the identity and existence of the indigenous people of the State. The report has talked of encroachment by these immigrants who also practise polygamy and are infamous for having very large families. It is no surprise that their number is increasing by the day in Assam, and this is the main reason why several districts of the State have now become Muslim-majority areas. The Assamese-speaking Muslims, who are indigenous in the State, have nothing to do with such immigrants.

Since there is economic vacuum in the State and it is for this reason that such immigrants find it very easy to settle here, it is high time the indigenous or the Assamese-speaking people of the State banned the immigrants from any domestic and/or other works, including construction works. Ravi Sarmah, Tezpur.

Anti-Assam Bill The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill 2016 is nothing but an assault on the identity of the Assamese people or the indigenous people of Assam as it seeks to give citizenship status to illegal Bangladeshi Hindus and violates the very essence of the Assam Accord. In a secular country, citizenship cannot be decided on the basis of religion. But the most important thing is that when Assam has already allowed millions of Bangladeshi nationals to get settled in the State after the liberation of East Pakistan as Bangladesh in 1971, why should there be any more settlement of people from Bangladesh?

Perhaps the BJP wants to build a new Hindu vote bank in Assam. It may be alright from the BJP’s ideological point of view but it cannot be at the cost of the very identity and existence of the indigenous people of the State.

Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal should have the courage to tell all this to his boss Narendra Modi. If he does not have the guts to say this, he should simply quit. After all, he is on record saying that as chief minister if he cannot protect the interests of his people who had voted him to power, he has no right to stay as chief minister. Now action should follow. Otherwise people will think he is cooking another story of deceit. And this will be tragic for a man who was behind the scrapping of the IM(DT) Act. Manas Deka, Chandmari, Guwahati.